Sucker rod guides



P 1961 H. E. BOWERMAN 3,001,834

SUCKER ROD cums Filed May 14, 1958 INVENTOR. HULIE E. BOWERMAN 7A7TORNEY United States Patent 3,001,834 SUCKER RQD GUIDES Hulie E. Bowerman, P.0. Box 152, Arlington, Tex. Filed May 14, 1958, Ser. No. 735,312 2 Claims. (Cl. 308-4) Thi invention relates to improvements in sucker rod guides commonly used in the pumping of fluids, such as oil and associated elements from wells. The rod string is by conventional means manipulated reciprocally of a pipe or tubing at or near the lower terminus of which there is positioned a working barrel with its standing valve. The traveling plunger and its valve and sealing elements are attached to the lower end of the rod string.

Guides of the general type to which my novel improvements are directed are well illustrated by the patent to Ward No. 2,604,364, in which a metal spring clip is embedded in a rubber-like material which latter provides a bearing whereby sections of the rod, its couplings and the like, are secured centrally of the tubing to prevent wearing of the metal parts as the rod moves up and down in the stroking of the pump. The embedded metal clip serve to provide a gripping of the rod by the guide. Attachment in the Ward type guide being attained by means of passing the rod radially through a slot or opening in the guide and clip. The rubber or rubber-like covering of the clip also may serve to protect it from deteriorating forces such as electrolytic or chemical actions.

In the manufacture of these conventional guides, the clip is embedded in a suitable quantity of the rubber-like material the whole being bonded together as by vulcanization, in which proces there frequently are entrapped minute pockets of gases, or other substances resulting in corresponding voids in the rubber. There may also occur weak spots in the knitting together of the particles of the rubber mass or even laminations in the rubber structure.

When these guides are lowered on the rod string into the well and lifting of the fluid column occurs, the guides are commonly immersed under hydrostatic pressures of several hundred psi. and in deeper wells these pressures may even exceed 2,000 to 5,000 lbs. p.s.i. Such submergence may continue for days, weeks or even months, during which gas particles or liquids which gassify under lower pressures may penetrate the body of the guide through its pores and occupy the voids therein. Should the standing valve fail at the bottom of the tubing string and permit a lowering of the fluid column in the tubing about the guide these entrapped gases or expansible liquids which turn to gases at lowered pressures, may so expand the body of the guides as to cause it to bind tightly in the tubing; then, when stroking of the pump is again attempted, the rod string may be buckled or pulled in two. Also, when the rod string is pulled for servicing the pump and the attached guides are removed from the well tubing and the static head and pressure of the fluid column the entrapped gases or gassifying liquids may expand the guides inside the tubing and cause a breaking of the rod or a stripping job. Should this not occur while the rods and guides are being withdrawn from the tubing, these expansive forces continue to work during full emergence of the guides and frequently so expands them so they will not re-enter the tubing, thus requiring a renewing of the guides when they are little worn from service.

My novel improvements in sucker rod guides which reice sult in much longer life and elimination of many of the defects in conventional guides will be readily appreciated by those skilled in the art from the following description together with the accompanying drawings in which:

FIGURE I is a perspective of my guide mounted on a section of a sucker rod;

FIGURE II is a section along line 2-2 of FIGURE I. In the several views like references indicate similar elements wherein: 5 is a sucker rod; 6 is a rubber-like body; 7 is a metal clip; 7'-7 is a slotted opening in the clip and body for passing the rod into opening 7"7 in the guide; 8-8 are voids in the rubber body, exaggerated for ready identification, 99 are perforations or punctures into the voids from the periphery of the guide body.

My invention is directed to the provision of means whereby the entrapped gases and gassifying liquids are permitted to escape from the body of the guide and consist preferably of punctures by a suitable sharp instrument inwardly of the rubber body to a suitably predetermined depth and of such frequencies as required to effectively perforate the objectionable voids in the rubber. These voids may be relieved by other suitable means such as molding apertures in the body. It i important that these punctures or escape passages not be of such depth as to expose the clip directly to the effects of the embedded gases and liquids entrapped within the body of the guide.

I desire to point out that other forms of guides such as all-rubber sleeves which are stretched over the ends of rods or tubings and which may depend on the inherent memory of the rubber to supply the necessary grip to a sucker rod, tubing or drill pipe, may be protected from these injurious effects of gases and gassifying liquids being entrapped by pressures in their bodies. All such are intended to be embraced by the following claims.

What I claim is:

1. In oil well equipment, a guide for a sucker rod comprising a cylindrical body molded of rubber-like material and having a longitudinal bore therethrough to receive the rod, said body having narrow pierced radial punctures extending deeply inwardly to depths short of said bore, said punctures being distributed over substantially all of said body and mutually spaced by distances not exceeding said depths of the punctures.

2. In oil well equipment, a guide for a sucker rod comprising a cylindrical body molded of resilient material and having a longitudinal bore therethrough to receive the rod and having a longitudinal slot through the body communicating with said bore; a C-shaped spring clip embedded within said body and surrounding said bore and the opening in the clip registering with said slot, and said body having narrow pierced radial punctures extending deeply inwardly to depths short of said clip, said punctures being distributed over substantially all of said body and mutually spaced by distances not exceeding said depths of the punctures.-

References Cited in the file of this patent UNITED STATES PATENTS 2,348,275 Aker May 9, 1944 2,405,799 Smeallie Aug. 13, 1946 2,506,188 Alviset May 2, 1950 2,568,944 Brigham Sept. 25, 1951 2,604,364 Ward July 22, 1952 2,655,113 Ward Oct. 13, 1953 2,770,282 Herzcgh Nov. 13, 1956 

